Performing information retrieval searches can be difficult. It has been observed that sometimes different people are looking for different search results, even though they input identical, or very similar, search queries. In order to address this problem, work has been done in attempting to personalize search engines. For instance, each time a search engine is used by a given user, data is collected for that user (such as query content and selected results) and the search engine is trained to return more accurately ranked search results in response to a future query entered by that user.
However, personalization of this type, itself, presents problems. One such problem is data sparseness. In other words, it takes a relatively long period of time to collect enough data to adequately personalize the search process for a given individual. Without sufficient data, personalization does not significantly improve search result accuracy.
Therefore, work has also been done in using collaborate filtering in the search process. Collaborative filtering attempts to group various queries together, given the query content. In other words, queries and results selected by users in response to those queries are analyzed to identify and group queries that have the same content. The selected results for each group of queries are then analyzed. The most often selected search results are identified for each of the group of queries. This information is used in order to assist in returning accurate search results in response to a future query.
However, this type of collaborative filtering can be costly. It requires some natural language analysis and classification of the content in each query. In addition, it has been found that different users may be seeking different results, even given queries that, when analyzed using natural language processing techniques, are drawn to similar, if not identical, content.
The discussion above is merely provided for general background information and is not intended to be used as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter.